Potting Shed Finale: The Budget Version

We have a difference of opinion, husband and I.  I say when we redeem our credit card points on a snazzy, bright orange Home Depot gift card, the plants subsequently hauled home are “free.”

He disagrees, bringing up the logical, but completely unnecessary, observation that the points are equivalent to dollars.  Such a killjoy!

Nonetheless, after pricing out my initial plans for the potting shed project, I decided to try to accomplish them with as much stuff as I could from the Big Box.  And I’m fairly happy with the result because it is a working potting shed, after all, and I’m not possessed of Martha Stewart’s ambition….or budget.

So goodbye to dreams of this:

Fantasy “After”

And hello to reality. We started out with this bereft little structure floating in the middle of our parking area:

We put some thoughts on paper….

….and revised those plans as we went along. Initially, I had hoped to install a picket fence around the perimeter and/or do some kind of boxwood edging.

Fencing around the whole garden is just too expensive, so we did a little accent fence in the back to define the border. And expensive bricks were replaced with pavers, a giant pile of which happened to be on sale.

Walkway edged with leftover bricks from another project

Boxwood did not make the final version either. Triple the price of the little Japanese hollies I selected, they also would grow much too large for their spot. Easy decision there.

The wooden frame on the wall will support an espalier of the fig tree. By this time next year, it should start taking shape.

Did I mention we had a construction supervisor? His salary demands were achievable…..

He occasionally asked for second opinions on plant selections:

A few details:

We built a nice little pergola with corbels I found about five years ago in an antiques booth owned by my friend, Dorothy. I planted two little hyacinth bean vine beans hoping they would germinate. Germinate? The thing has become a menacing presence since I took the photo below. There’s a reason for the Jack and the Beanstalk story.

The potting shed is out in open territory  susceptible to the ravages of deer and without easy access to water. Plantings have to be drought tolerant and varmint-resistant. This garden is not for sissies:

Knowing that deer avoid the blueish, furry, and highly aromatic plants, I selected lamb’s ear, Russian sage, lavender, creeping thyme, and rosemary along with a pot of succulents and some blue fescue. Love how that blue grass really adds a nice, squat textural element to the little bed.

OK, so the walkways are built, the fence is installed and painted, the plants are dug in and settled, and it looks like this now:

I used two big containers that were languishing in the garage as definers for the two front corners and planted some empty terra cotta pots for either side of the walkway to the door. The cobblestone for the walkway was leftover from a demolition project and worked perfectly here.

We introduced a couple new members to the Concrete Menagerie for this garden. The first, a cute little pig, remains unnamed. A certain evil friend of mine suggested “Prosciutto.” One is not amused.

And every country place needs a big ol’ Foghorn Leghorn, doesn’t it? Cock-a-doodle-doo, y’all!

Not exactly sticking to my budget here, but he was irresistible.

I had an old window frame to which we attached a little window box. I’ve held off having one here for ages because, well, I like to make the deer at least bend down to devour my plants instead of offering them up on a silver platter, so to speak. But then I spied these gorgeous ornamental peppers and thought “Aha!” Unless my deer develop a taste for Mexican, I am all set.

You can see that the hyacinth bean vine is working its way around the shed now. If I ever go missing, look for my lifeless body entangled in this vine first, okay?

And there you have it! Next year I’ll see what worked and what didn’t, plant-wise. And I’m thinking it needs some kind of edging, don’t you? Next year, next year….

Oh, and I almost forgot the very best part!! Thanks to my friend, Pat, who suggested in an earlier post that I should have one of these…..

Are you ready? It’s quite wonderful, you know. Prepare yourself…..

Ta Da!!!!

Thanks for reading and let me know your ideas to name little Piglet,

Barbara